As many as 30 lockers were broken into over the last weekend and the police are yet to make any arrest in the case. The incident was reported on the morning of June 12.

The police have called upon residents to provide clues about the suspect seen in the CCTV footage.(Sakib Ali/HT File)

The Ghaziabad police are seeking public support to identify the man seen inside the bank strongroom of Punjab National Bank’s (PNB) Kapda Mill branch to crack the heist.

As many as 30 lockers were broken into over the last weekend and the police are yet to make any arrest in the case. The incident was reported on the morning of June 12.

The police have called upon residents to provide clues about the suspect seen in the CCTV footage. Several teams are working on leads but have so far failed to crack the case which seems to be the handiwork of a professional gang, along with some local support, the police said.

Since the mill has hundreds of houses located near the outer wall, the police have also woven a web of local informers to trace suspicious households from where the gang members could have entered the vacant mill complex.

“We have also roped in informers to mix with the locals to get clues about the culprits,” a senior officer said.

Apart from probing the houses in the vicinity of the closed down mill complex, the police are also scanning any openings that might have aided the gang’s entry into the mill. The police are also probing the guards posted at four gates of the shut mill in order to find clues.

During the incident, the first gang member entered the bank strongroom on Saturday evening and put up a cloth over the CCTV camera installed inside the room. The gang also dodged the motion sensors that were to get automatically activated at 9pm. In all, the gang escaped with valuable worth crores from 30 of the 435 lockers in the branch. The bank strongroom was breached by the gang after boring a hole from the rear.

“We also picked up a number of suspicious persons in connection with the burglary but we are yet to get any strong clue. Our teams are also using electronic surveillance methods to trace the gang. Their entry/exit points are also being probed,” the officer, said.

The police are also trying to trace previous incidents wherein materials inside the mill complex were stolen. The mill shut in 1993 and remains isolated, with an overgrowth of vegetation and trees.

“The gang entered the mill complex and bored a hole at the back of the strongroom. We are trying to match it with the modus operandi of different persons involved in thefts inside the mill. The houses around the mill complex are also being scanned. Our teams are working to trace the ‘professional’ gang,” AK Maurya, superintendent of police (rural), said.